Ikon and macLYON present works by over twenty artists from the British Council Collection and macLYON that explore the theme of friendship.  
Curated collaboratively, the exhibition interrogates friendship as a fundamental human relationship that is essential to individual well-being and society. Taking place in the partner cities of Birmingham and Lyon, Friends in Love and War – L’Éloge des meilleur·es ennemi·es, also reflects on diplomatic friendships and how regional capitals and cultural organisations can create new ways of living and working together in a post-Brexit climate. The exhibition spans painting, drawing, photography, printmaking, textile, film, sculpture and installation, combining existing and new works by international and Birmingham-based artists to form a rich depiction of our complex personal and political friendships.
Artists: Kenneth Armitage, Sonia Boyce, Tereza Bušková, Pogus Caesar, Patrick Caulfield, Jimmie Durham, Tracey Emin, Marie-Anita Gaube, Lola Gonzàlez, Emma Hart, Lubaina Himid, Géraldine Kosiak, Delaine Le Bas, Markéta Luskacová, Rachel Maclean, Goshka Macuga, Madame Yevonde, Gordon Matta-Clark, Hetain Patel, Paula Rego, Luke Routledge, Niek van de Steeg, Francis Upritchard, Fabien Verschaere, Gillian Wearing, Bedwyr Williams, Rose Wylie and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye.
This exhibition is supported by the British Council and is presented as part of UK/France Spotlight on Culture 2024, Together We Imagine,  with additional support from Fluxus Art Projects and Birmingham City University.
This exhibition is presented as part of Ikon’s 60th anniversary year. For more information:
Saturday 15 June sees the opening of the Future is Now exhibition at Le Parvis in Tarbes, which runs until 5 October.
 
For its part, the contemporary art centre, which in 50 years has programmed more than 300 exhibitions, will be blowing out its candles with an exhibition in feedback and prospective mode, entitled Future is now, which will invite some fifty artists who exhibited between 1974 and 2024 to return to the scene of the crime! One of the first contemporary art institutions to be set up in France¹, Le Parvis is also one of the most unusual...
More here on the Parvis website